In spite of everything we managed a holiday. Family in a van. Changeable weather. Changeable moods. Same sky. I took paper and pencil and wrote a poem a day, by way of capturing them as they passed by. If you wish sit back, read, listen and take a trip with me, see where it takes your mind and memories, day by day, until we return safely home. 

Day One 
The lake whipped up
An artificial blue
making home for human,
boat and swan.
Thick mud under foot,
best to stay afloat.
Shrieks of joy,
banter with strangers,
roaming dogs,
feral children.
The threat of rain
which never comes
 
Time fades,
it is not significant here.


Day Two

The wind blew through today
bringing a perpetual freshness,
a transience to the day.
Wind bringing up miniature showers
of spray from under the pedlo
Wind cooling the warmth
Of the locked van.
Wind tousling my unbrushed hair,
caressing my unmade up face.
Wind blowing freely,
as it ever does.
Changing all the spaces
it is in,
if only for a few moments.
Blowing away what was there,
drawing along something new.


Day Three

A day of changing light
grey light,
green light, as cast
through the trees.
Fire light,
bright flame,
glowing ember.
Fairy light,
on soft bed,
as eyelids close,
gathering memories
known only by our dreams
and the watchful trees.


Day Four 



The ease with which a day passes
when in the company of friends.
The time slipping
seamlessly into
one long glorious day.
There is only lightness here,
and softness,
and joy.
Everything, just for a moment,
in this place,
is exactly
as it should be.


Day Five


A confusing day
A ‘why me?’ day
Calculating the injustices
in my head.
Hearing and seeing
the honestness of life
It’s wounds and scars
cannot be hidden
or ignored for long
We, the walking wounded
carry ourselves
where ever we go,
stumbling forward
into our next step.

Day Six


The rain fell through
the light onto the
body of brown canal water
in such a way
that it appeared
as fireflies skitting,
Or as bright dots
behind the eyes in a head rush,
or as disco lasers dancing
across a sticky pub floor.
A moment of absurd beauty,
Appearing where it does not belong,
but it turns up anyway.
A glimpse of the miraculous
on an otherwise
less than ordinary day.

Day Seven 


Take me to the river
Where the water flows
Cool and deep
Each glimpse of a
Passing body of water
Washes over my soul
Rinsing away
The dirt stuck there
Mile by mile
River by river
I am healed.

Day Eight 


The feral hunter gatherer’s
brown paper bag
is brimming
with rocks, like dinosaur eggs
Lichen from the fairy woods,
sticks whose value is known
only to their owner
endowed with attributes
of the imagination.
 
These collected treasures
were joined today
by gifts from the sea.
Sandy enormous shells,
a crab claw
Memories of a jelly fish graveyard
washed up on shore
Their bouncy bodies
acting as a trampoline
for broken starfish
The tales of a small girl,
discoveries of five year old eyes
wonders of a growing heart.
Clutched by sticky fingers
in a brown paper bag.

Day Nine


The sand
here
tells of
ships
stones
sailors
shells
 
Some now
so fine
they are barely
there.
Unless it is
in your eye
where it becomes
a football.
 
Sand, the only terrain
which is always
a canvas.
An artists dream
to rewrite tales
from the fragments
of untold stories
Ground down
into particles
layer upon layer
forming a golden canvas
for creations anew.

Day Ten 



Nothing but air above
Nothing but water below
The membrane between
The two is paper thin.
For floating on,
for cutting through
arm over arm
 
Face down is another world
which belongs to the creatures
of the deep.
Face up, to breath and view
the canopy above,
another world unobtainable.
 
You will find me here
on this glassy surface
where one element
meets another.
 
Impenetrable to both,
neither home to me.
 
Yet my presence 
forges a connection
between them,
And, even so,
between the elements
of air and water
that reside within my soul.